Purpose: While clinical governance is assumed to be part of organisational structures and policies, implementation of clinical governance in practice (the praxis) can be markedly different. This paper draws on insights from hospital clinicians, managers and governors on how they interpret the...

Purpose Clinical governance (CG) is an important foundation for a high-performing health care system, with many countries supporting its development. CG policy may be developed and implemented nationally, or devolved to a local level, with implications for the overall approach to implementation...

Purpose: A doctoral dissertation is a challenging undertaking requiring determination, persistence and resilience over a long time: four to six years’ study or more. These PhD “rules of the game” are intended to help students successfully navigate this challenge....

Purpose: There are several basic, and at times minor, pedantic principles required to successfully publish in good-quality international peer-reviewed journals. These are what the author calls the “rules of the game”. Many are so basic, so taken-for-granted, tacit knowledge, that at times...

Purpose: The UK private finance initiative (PFI) public policy is heavily criticised. PFI contracts are highly profitable leading to incentives for PFI private-sector companies to support PFI public policy. This contested nature of PFIs requires legitimation by PFI private-sector companies, by...

Purpose: A royal charter of incorporation imposing public benefit/social responsibilities established the privately owned British South Africa Company (BSAC), in return for power to exploit a huge territory using low-cost local labour. This study explores the dual principal–agent problem of...

Purpose: Taking a communication perspective, the paper explores management's rhetoric in profit warnings, whose sole purpose is to disclose unexpected bad news. Design/methodology/approach: Adopting a close-reading approach to text analysis, the authors analyse three profit warnings of the...